National Association of Counties honors Lake County with its 26th achievement award

RELEASE DATE: June 18, 2008

TAVARES — The National Association of Counties (NACo) recently awarded Lake County with a distinguished Achievement Award, which recognizes innovative county government programs. Lake County officials received notice that the program to be honored at the annual NACo conference is the Festival of Reading.

“I am particularly proud of this honor because it recognizes the hard work our library system does to encourage residents to read,” said County Commissioner Welton Cadwell, Chairman of the Lake County Board of County Commissioners. “I congratulate library staff for reaching out to the public in new ways and for producing a meaningful event that benefits our community.”

The Festival of Reading, which is hosted annually by the Lake County Library System promotes reading and the love of literature through activities such as meeting the authors, sharing thoughts about books and writing, attending music and dance performances of many cultures, and sharing personal poetry and writing.

Since its inception in 2004, the weeklong festival is presented in the spring. The festival hosts nationally recognized authors during a series of events held in each of the 13 libraries and special venues throughout the County making them convenient to all residents. Each year, an opening day event is held to heighten awareness for the festival.

At the Fifth Annual Festival of Reading, held March 29-April 5, 2008, more than two dozen guest authors and an estimated 3,500 residents participated in the series of events.
The Sixth Annual Festival of Reading is scheduled for March 25-28, 2009, and the theme is “Fantastic Florida.”

For more information about the Lake County Library System or annual Festival of Reading, call Judy Buckland, Program Coordinator, at (352) 253-6167 or log on to www.mylakelibrary.org.

Since 1994, Lake County has been recognized 26 times with NACo Achievement Awards. Last year, NACo awarded the Lake County Department of Public Works, Stormwater Management Section, for its Flood Determination and Mapping Program. The program provides property owners with accurate data and allows County staff to add or revise a floodplain as better information comes available. The program included digitizing flood maps and scanning more than 2,000 documents.